Chapter 12 - Page 2

were hardly in the lee fore rigging, before I saw the fifty
falling off to our course, her yards squared, and signs aboard her that
she had larboard studding sails as well as ourselves. The change of course
had one good effect, however: it brought our pursuer so far on our
quarter, that, standing at the capstan, I saw him through the mizen
rigging. This took the Dawn completely from under the Leander's broadside,
leaving us exposed to merely four or five of her forward guns, should she
see fit to use them. Whether the English were reluctant to resort to such
very decided means of annoyance, so completely within the American waters,
as we were clearly getting to be, or whether they had so much confidence
in their speed, as to feel no necessity for firing, I never knew; but they
did not have any further recourse to shot.

As might have been foreseen, the fifty had her extra canvass spread some
time before we could open ours, and I fancied she showed the advantage
thus obtained in her rate of sailing. She certainly closed with us, though
we closed much faster with the land: still, there was imminent danger of
her overhauling us before we could round the point, unless some decided
step were promptly taken to avoid it.

"On the whole, Mr. Marble," I said, after my mates and myself had taken a
long and thoughtful look at the actual state of things--"On the whole, Mr.
Marble, it may be well to take in our light sails, haul our wind, and let
the man-of-war come up with us. We are honest folk, and there is little
risk in his seeing all we have to show him."

"Never think of it!" cried the mate. "After this long pull, the fellow
will be as savage as a bear with a sore head. He'd not leave a hand on
board us, that can take his trick at the wheel; and it's ten chances to
one that he would send the ship to Halifax, under some pretence or other,
that the sugars are not sweet enough, or that the coffee was grown in a
French island, and tastes French. No--no--Captain Wallingford--here's
the wind at sou'-sou'-west, and we're heading nothe-east,
and-by-nothe-half-nothe already, with that fellow abaft the mizen riggin';
as soon as we get a p'int more to the nor'ard, we'll have him fairly in
our wake."

"Ay, that will do very well as a theory, but what can we make of it in
practice? We are coming up towards Montauk at the rate of eight knots, and
you have told me yourself there is a reef off that point, directly towards
which we must this moment be standing. At this rate, fifteen minutes might
break us up into splinters."

I could see that Marble was troubled, by the manner in which he rolled his
tobacco about, and the riveted gaze he kept on the water ahead. I had